Chapter 4 - The Leader of the Pack
At first, it felt like I was listening to a radio that lost its station, and I was fiddling with the knobs to find it again. The voices sounded disconnected and came form various places around me. They skipped, bouncing around me from odd locations, and different one surfaced every few minutes. There was a female at my head, then a male by my feet, then another male at my side, saying words I didn't understand I couldn't feel pain, but I felt extremely annoyed.
Why wouldn't they explain to me what happened? Why weren't they trying to wake me up or something? I pushed with whatever limbs I still had left to make myself known. Instead, I heard a low groan, and I realized it came from me. My eyes opened up, and then narrowed form a bright light above me.
I was in the back of an ambulance, and there were paramedics crowding me, taking my stats and whatnot and shouting things at each other. I squinted and tried to see things more clearly, but my mind fogged over and their faces blurred. I couldn't move my hands but I could turn my head, and I saw that someone was sitting on the narrow seat lining the side of the vehicle.
Edward Cullen. I saw his pale face before I could comprehend why I was seeing him. Before I blanked out, I had heard him beside me, his voice so whisper quiet I could hardly believe he said it.
No. The word was concrete in my head, but I didn't know if he said it, or if I said it, or if I had dreamed the whole thing up and he wasn't really sitting there. But, I felt pressure on my right hand, and I glanced down. His fingers fit between mine, his fair skin matching mine. My eyes wandered sluggishly back to his face, and noticed his eyes were desperately watching my face. I tried to smile, glad that he was there with me instead of someone else.
"What the hell happened?" I struggled to say. It felt like someone else was speaking for me.
"You stopped walking right when Mike Newton pulled into the lot. It was almost too late for him to stop, so I pushed you out of the way," his voice was shaky as he replied, and I felt him squeeze my hand.
"Sorry about that," I whispered, giving a small laugh. His lips, once white as his skin, twisted into a pained smile as he looked over my head. I couldn't lift my head that far, so I looked to him, my eyes full of fright. He was close enough to e then that I could see my reflection in his eyes. Distorted as it was, I could detect the fear in myself.
His mouth was at my ear, whispering fast. "They need to take you away now, but I'll be right there. Don't worry."
Before I could ask what he was talking about, the door behind me burst open, blowing in cold air form the outside. I was being ferried down, and my hands quickly grasped the metal sides of whatever carried me. There was a sudden jolt, some jostling about, and then I was flying backwards, watching Edward leap down from the back of the ambulance, his eyes never leaving me for a second.
I saw everything backwards. Doors closed behind us and people walked until they disappeared form my line of view. Doctors soon joined the party and began asking questions, looking at me with close inspection, peering into my eyes, checking my pulse, asking f anything hurt. As the sleepy feeling began to wear off, I felt throbbing by my right ear. I moaned and nodded when someone gently pressed their fingertips to that spot, and a chorus of murmuring echoed around me. I saw Edward's face looming over me as he spoke to the doctors.
A small team of nurses took over when the medics left, and they picked me up and placed me on a different bed. It was softer and had no railing on it. My head sank into a soft pillow, which briefly distracted me from the constant pulsating coming from my head. There was a similar ache at my right elbow and knees, probably from where I landed. I tried to move, but the pain pierced me suddenly and I cried out. A nurse came to my side and soothed me back into a comfortable position. When I glanced back at Edward, his eyes were on me again, and I could see he looked like how I was feeling.
"I tried to keep her from hitting the pavement, but the more important thing for me was to keep us form getting hit," his gentle voice explained as I was wheeled into an empty room. He sat in one of the chairs with a doctor as the rest of nurses crowded around me, taking all sorts of tests. All I wanted to see was what had happened to me. I craned my neck to catch my reflection in something: a mirror, a metal basin, even the vase that held flowers by my bed.
"Can I have a mirror please?" I said, my voice cracked and filled with pain. A different nurse paused and reluctantly held up a compact to my face. It was small and hard to see into, but I found bruises rising on the right side of my face, red cuts grazing my cheek.
I swallowed and blinked back the tears that welled up in my eyes and I turned my face away, not wanting to see it anymore. The harsh snap of the compact closing was followed by a male voice further away from me.
"Could you prep a few scans for her, Miriam? I'll be down with her in a few minutes," it was the doctor questioning Edward. I heard the squeak of a chair as footsteps came by my bed, to my left where I was facing. I opened my eyes and saw a man with blonde worriedly smiling down at me. He didn't look at all familiar until Edward stood beside him.
"I'm Dr. Cullen, Miss Swan," he said in a clam voice, "I understand my son saved you form being hit by a car?"
I nodded, my throat too dry to speak again.
"Well, you were unconscious for about ten minutes, but you seem to show no signs of a concussion. We wills till need to take a few x-rays to make sure you haven't broken anything. As you can see, there are some cuts and bruises on your face, but you will recover from those quickly. Broken bones don't heal as fast." He clicked his pen open and scribbled something down his clipboard. Edward sat down on the edge of the bed and looked up at his father.
"She'll be okay, right? You've seen worse than this walk away with only a few scratches." His voice was nervous and shaky again, like he was about to cry. I scooted over to give him room.
His father's reply was grave, and it made me shiver. "She'll be fine, but I need to see if there is any brain damage before I send her home. And that time before the person was wearing a helmet." Dr. Cullen clicked his pen shut and closed his clipboard, giving me a smile before he headed for the door. Looking back, he said to us both, "There will be a nurse by soon to take you to get your x-ray scans done. Watch over her, Edward. You know how to reach someone form here." With that, he shut the door behind him and we were alone.
It was silent for a good minute, and I listened to Edward's hitched breathing. After a moment, his face turned to me, and his eyes were rimmed with red. I bit my lip as I felt a lump rise in my throat. I had never had anyone cry over me like that. When I was five and I broke my collarbone climbing in a tree, my dad carried me to the ER without a single tear, even though his skin was just as pale as this boy's.
"I've never seen anyone die," he whispered, his hand fumbling over the blanket to find mine. Our fingers touch and his were wet from wiping his eyes.
I was dumbfounded. "What are you talking about?"
"I thought you were going to die. I saw you standing there, staring at my sisters, and I saw your face. But it was pale and your eyes were closed, like you were already dead before the car had a chance to hit you. And while I was running to you, I thought of how I've never seen a dead person. I didn't even see my folks die or go to their funeral. I was only four," he rambled on, rubbing his thumb over my skin.
I shook my head the best that I could. "I'm not going to die. And you are a good friend." I saw him freeze and then look at me, his eyes wide with surprise.
"You saved my life, and you came with me here," I continued, "I don't know why you think of yourself like that, but I think you're pretty amazing." My aches and pains, still present, were slowly fading back again. I was able to lean on my left elbow to get a better look at him. He looked nothing like the boy I saw on my computer screen the night before.
Before I could say anything else, a nurse bustled in and told Edward he had to stay where he was. He sat back down in his chair, and as the nurse helped me into a wheelchair, I noticed my backpack was sitting my his feet like an obedient dog. He gave me a hopeful smile as I left room, and I couldn't mine off my face until I entered the x-ray room.
By the time I got back to my room, someone else was waiting for me, and he jumped up as soon as the nurse helped me crawl back under the sheets of the bed.
"Sweetie! Thank God you're okay!" Charlie exclaimed as he rushed forward to give me a hug, pausing when he saw me flinch. "I'm sorry, Bells." He gave me a soft hug and quickly retreated to pull a chair close to the side of the bed. He wasn't blanch or crying, but he did look very worried as he dumped question after question on me.
"What happened? Do you know how bad it is? Are you feeling okay? Would you like me to call your Mom-"
"Dad, slow down!" I interjected, overwhelmed by everything, "I'm fine. I don't have any broken bones, no fractured skull. Just a few cuts and bruises from the fall. I was in the parking lot at school when Mike pulled in. I was standing in the middle of the lane and he didn't have time to put on the brakes, so...someone shoved me out of the way. I'm supposed to be in here until someone signs me out."
Dr. Cullen had congratulated her in the hall about being a lucky girl but she didn't feel so lucky. And now Edward was gone, I felt suddenly very lonely.
"Okay Bells," Dad replied, sighing with relief as he stood from the chair, "I'll be right back. We'll have you singed out and in the car in no time." He left the room after giving me a kiss on the forehead, and then I was truly and utterly alone.
I counted the holes on the ceiling. I listened to the murmuring of voices muffled by the closed door. I hummed songs to myself as I picked at threads on the blanket and thought of the headlights I saw. They weren't on, it being light outside, but the round shape of them was vivid in my mind. I couldn't remember seeing anyone run to my side, nor could I recall feeling anything but a hard shove and a thump against my head. I didn't even have time or energy to hear his voice, but now that I was lucid it came flooding back to me.
"She's going to be alright, right? She isn't responding to me. Bella! Can you hear me?"
"Damn it, Ed, clam down! She'll be fine, just stay where the hell you are and the ambulance will be here!"
"Don't tell me to calm the fuck down, Rose! She could die!"
"She won't die, you know that. Keep here head up and try to wake her up. Why did you push her instead of pulling her, anyways? She wouldn't have hit her head like that."
"I didn't have time to think about that. Leave us alone, okay? Get to class..."
Shaking my head to throw off the voices, I cleared my head and stared at the door, pushing myself up onto my elbows so I could see better. As soon as I was comfortable, Charlie opened the door, this time the one with the wheelchair.
"They don't want you to be running around for a little while, so we're borrowing this for a few days," he said as I gingerly scooted over to the edge of the bed where Edward was sitting before. I winced as I picked myself up and eased into the cool seat of the wheelchair, and leaned back while my dad pushed me out the open door. I kept my head down as some of the nurses waved and wished me good luck for my recovery.
"You'll be right as rain, Bells. You're my baby girl," my dad said as he exited through the automatic doors, into the cold once more. I nodded my head, but it felt like a lie. Rain was a filthy liar.